Tax, business & compliance,
explained clearly.

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Accounting Standards & Bookkeeping

Internal audit of sales and receivables: the order-to-cash cycle, pricing and discount approvals, credit limits, dispatch and invoicing controls, collections and revenue leakage tests

Plan from a risk assessment, map the order-to-cash steps, test the design and operation of the key controls and use analytics to find leakage before testing items. The usual control points are customer master, price and discount approval, credit limit, dispatch-to-invoice matching, collection and...

6 min read05 Oct 2026→

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Accounting Standards & Bookkeeping

Internal audit of payroll and human resources: employee master data, attendance and leave, payroll processing, statutory deductions, full and final settlements and segregation of duties

Audit payroll from the risk assessment: test who is on the master, whether pay follows attendance and approvals, whether deductions and settlements are computed under the applicable rules and whether no one person can create, approve and pay. Under SIA 150 the auditor evaluates the compliance...

6 min read05 Oct 2026→

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Accounting Standards & Bookkeeping

Internal audit of treasury and related party transactions: cash and bank controls, investments, borrowings and covenants, and SIA 18 on related parties

Treasury is audited from the risk assessment: bank and cash controls, investment approvals, borrowing terms and covenant monitoring. For related parties, SIA 18 makes management responsible for identifying and disclosing them, and asks the internal auditor to evaluate the related controls, look for...

7 min read05 Oct 2026→

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Accounting Standards & Bookkeeping

Audit, review, agreed-upon procedures and compilation: what each engagement is, the level of assurance it gives and when a business needs which

An audit gives reasonable assurance (high, but not absolute) and ends in an opinion. A review under SRE 2400 (Revised) gives limited assurance and ends in a conclusion. Agreed-upon procedures (SRS 4400) and compilation (SRS 4410 Revised) give no assurance at all: the first reports factual findings...

7 min read05 Oct 2026→

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Accounting Standards & Bookkeeping

Audit of property, plant and equipment and intangible assets: the assertions, what the auditor verifies for additions, disposals, depreciation, title and impairment, and the documents to keep ready

The auditor ties each class of asset to the assertions: existence, rights and obligations, completeness, valuation and allocation, and presentation and disclosure. For PPE the usual tests are vouching additions, examining disposals, recomputing depreciation, inspecting title documents and...

7 min read05 Oct 2026→

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Accounting Standards & Bookkeeping

Audit of inventories: attending the physical count, cut-off, roll-forward procedures, valuation at cost or net realisable value and stock held by third parties

When inventory is material, the auditor must attend the physical count unless that is impracticable (SA 501, paragraph 4). If the count is on another date, the auditor tests movements between the count date and year end (paragraph 5). If attendance is impracticable, the auditor performs alternative...

7 min read04 Oct 2026→

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Accounting Standards & Bookkeeping

Audit of revenue and trade receivables: the presumed fraud risk in revenue recognition, cut-off tests, external confirmations, alternative procedures, ageing and the allowance for doubtful debts

SA 240 (paragraph 26) tells the auditor to presume that there are fraud risks in revenue recognition and to evaluate which revenue types or transactions give rise to them. The auditor then tests cut-off, confirms balances directly with customers under SA 505, uses alternative procedures where there...

7 min read04 Oct 2026→

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Accounting Standards & Bookkeeping

Audit of trade payables, expenses, provisions and cash and bank balances: the search for unrecorded liabilities, supplier and bank confirmations, bank reconciliations, cash counts and litigation and claims

The auditor's key risk on payables, expenses and provisions is understatement, so the work centres on the search for unrecorded liabilities. Bank balances are normally confirmed directly with the bank (SA 505, paragraph 7), and bank reconciliations are tested for old or unusual reconciling items...

7 min read04 Oct 2026→

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Accounting Standards & Bookkeeping

Audit of share capital, reserves and borrowings: authorisation by the board and members, statutory registers and filings, loan agreements, charges, covenants, lender confirmations and finance costs

For capital and borrowings the auditor ties each balance to authority (board and member approvals), records (registers, loan agreements, sanction letters), third-party evidence (lender and registrar confirmations under SA 505) and law (SA 250 asks for evidence on laws with a direct effect on the...

7 min read04 Oct 2026→

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Accounting Standards & Bookkeeping

Audit of charitable trusts, societies and NGOs: understanding the entity, grants and donations, restricted funds, foreign contribution, programme expenses and the auditor's report

The auditor of a non-profit begins by understanding the entity: its legal form, objects, funders, regulators and how money moves (SA 315, paragraph 11). The key risks are incomplete recording of donations, funds spent against the purpose they were given for and unsupported programme expenses...

7 min read04 Oct 2026→

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Accounting Standards & Bookkeeping

Audit of educational institutions and hospitals: understanding the entity, fee and patient billing income, grants, medicine and consumable inventories, fixed assets and payroll

The audit starts with understanding the entity, its revenue streams and controls (SA 315, paragraph 11). Income depends on volumes and tariffs, so the auditor tests billing controls (SA 330, paragraph 8) and uses analytical checks such as students multiplied by fee, or bed occupancy multiplied by...

7 min read05 Oct 2026→

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Accounting Standards & Bookkeeping

SRS 4400, Engagements to Perform Agreed-upon Procedures regarding Financial Information: objective, terms of the engagement, procedures and evidence, and the report of factual findings

In an agreed-upon procedures engagement the accountant performs specified procedures on specified financial information and issues a report of factual findings. No assurance is expressed (paragraph 5): the reader decides what the findings mean. The report is restricted to the parties who agreed the...

7 min read05 Oct 2026→

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Accounting Standards & Bookkeeping

SRS 4410 (Revised), Compilation Engagements: when the standard applies, what the practitioner does and does not do, misleading information, documentation and the compilation report

In a compilation the accountant helps prepare financial information from what management provides, and reports in a way that makes the limited role clear. The accountant is not required to verify the accuracy or completeness of the information (paragraph 6) and the report cannot carry an opinion or...

7 min read05 Oct 2026→

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Accounting Standards & Bookkeeping

SRE 2400 (Revised), Engagements to Review Historical Financial Statements (part 1 of 2): limited assurance, who may use the standard, acceptance, materiality, and inquiry and analytical procedures

SRE 2400 (Revised) applies when the practitioner is not the auditor of the entity's financial statements (paragraphs 1 and 2). It is a limited assurance engagement, done primarily by inquiry and analytical procedures (paragraphs 5 to 7). The practitioner must accept the engagement only on proper...

7 min read05 Oct 2026→

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Accounting Standards & Bookkeeping

SRE 2400 (Revised), Engagements to Review Historical Financial Statements (part 2 of 2): subsequent events, written representations, evaluating evidence, the unmodified and modified conclusion, the practitioner's report and documentation

The practitioner requests written representations from management, evaluates whether enough evidence has been obtained, and then forms a conclusion in the negative form ("nothing has come to our attention"). The conclusion is unmodified, qualified, adverse or a disclaimer. The report must state...

7 min read05 Oct 2026→

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Accounting Standards & Bookkeeping

SRE 2410, Review of Interim Financial Information Performed by the Independent Auditor of the Entity: the engagement, review procedures, evaluating misstatements, management representations and the review report

SRE 2410 applies to the independent auditor of the entity reviewing interim financial information (paragraph 1). The aim is a conclusion on whether anything has come to attention suggesting the information is not prepared in all material respects under the framework, with the risk of an...

8 min read05 Oct 2026→

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Accounting Standards & Bookkeeping

SAE 3400, The Examination of Prospective Financial Information: forecasts and projections, the assurance the auditor can give, acceptance, examining the assumptions and the report

Under SAE 3400 the accountant examines the assumptions behind prospective financial information and whether the figures are properly prepared from them. Because the evidence is about the future, the accountant gives only moderate assurance on the assumptions (paragraph 9) and cannot say the results...

8 min read05 Oct 2026→

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Accounting Standards & Bookkeeping

SAE 3402, Assurance Reports on Controls at a Service Organisation: the service auditor's engagement, the description of the system, design and operating effectiveness of controls, and type 1 and type 2 reports

SAE 3402 is for a service auditor engaged by the service organisation. The auditor gives reasonable assurance, in a positive-form opinion, on the service organisation's description of its system, the design of controls and, in a type 2 report, their operating effectiveness over a period. A type 1...

8 min read05 Oct 2026→